Ten foods you should avoid to have great skin

There has never been a truer saying than you are what you eat. Your skin, which is your largest organ, can tell you a lot about how healthy you are. If you’re struggling with a skin condition, such as acne, the first thing you should look at is your diet. Is it as good as it could be?

What you put into your body doesn’t just affect how big, small, fat, thin or muscly you are. It can also affect your mental health – and your skin.

To have great skin, many of us spend lots of money on beauty products while overlooking our diet. But it is actually what we eat that can either make our skin shine with a radiant glow, or make it go pale, redden and/or itch.

If you want healthier skin, here are 10 foods that you need to avoid:

Sugar

Ah, sugar. As kids, we all ate sugar. Our parents weren’t fully aware of the consequences of eating too much sugar, and diabetes wasn’t properly understood. Moreover, we loved sugar so much that our parents stopping us from eating it wasn’t an option. If they did, we’d probably have ran away from home!

Now that you’re older, you probably know how unhealthy sugar is. It’s linked to diabetes, and i can cause obesity and rotten teeth. But have you given it up yet? If you knew how badly it affects your skin, perhaps you wouldn’t think twice about cutting it out!

Yep, as addictive as sugar is, it’s just plain bad for you and can cause acne among other skin conditions.

“Mystery” meat

Okay, I don’t want to scare you with this one. What I mean by mystery meat is meat whose journey you have no clue of.

What was the animal fed? How was it raised? Was it force-fed hormones and antibiotics?

Who knows?

You don’t know – which is why you should avoid it.

Mystery meat is wrapped in chemical cocktails that are total mysteries to us. And these chemical cocktails will wreak havoc with your gorgeous skin, cause inflammation, acne and lots of other bad stuff.

Dairy

We’re told (mainly by the dairy industry who want us to keep buying their products) that cow’s milk is the best source of calcium. It isn’t. If it were, why are so many cow milk-drinking American’s calcium deficient?

You don’t need dairy. And if your skin isn’t as glowing as you’d like it to be, dairy could be the culprit.

You don’t have to cut out dairy altogether, but too much dairy in your diet can cause cystic breakouts that just won’t go away.

‘Healthy’ cereals

So you swapped the Count Chocula for Muesli because everyone’s told you that it’s healthier. You feel better simply because you’ve made the switch.

But are you looking any better? Possibly not.

This is because these so-called healthy cereals are full of ingredients that are not kind to your skin, such as aded sugar. They are also usually highly refined, and can cause spikes in your blood sugar levels.

Artificial sweeteners

Lots of dieters who swap full-fat soda for diet soda assume they’re doing themselves a huge favour. But while the idea is commendable, it’s unfortunately misguided.

Unlike sugar, artificial sweetener may very well have zero calories. But they are instead a chemical experiment that should not really be inside your body.

And when they are inside your body, they can cause histamine reactions and inflammation. The result is skin that doesn’t look so great. Not cool.

Rice cakes

Remember when super models said all they ate were rice cakes? To look like them, perhaps you started to eat lots of rice cakes, too.

Super models don’t eat them anymore. Why? Because rice cake actually cause spikes in your blood sugar levels. This is bad news for your complexion, as it causes wrinkles to form prematurely.

Caffeine

I love coffee, and I’m sure many of you who are reading this do, too. Many people all around the world can’t function properly until they’ve had their morning coffee, while the average coffee drinker gets through at least three cups a day.

The problem is that caffeine can wreak havoc with your skin. It’s been linked to psoriasis flare-ups, and can cause premature wrinkles and sagging.

This is largely down to the fact that caffeine is a diuretic that dehydrates you. And dehydrated skin is not cool.

If you know you drink too much coffee, try swapping it for green tea to see what happens to your skin.

Gluten

Too much gluten can cause all kinds of issues, including celiac disease and bad skin. Unfortunately, it’s also a cornerstone of many western diets – especially the U.S. diet.

Why? Because it’s a protein found in lots of grains that has generally been considered pretty good for us. Until now.

Gluten can cause inflammation, which has a nasty habit of showing up on your skin. Reducing gluten can reduce inflammation, and improve your complexion.

Processed foods

According to Fast Food Nation, most of the money American’s spend on food goes on processed food, such as ready meals and canned soup. While these foods are a matter of convenience (and sometimes taste – blame the excess salt content), they’re not a matter of health – in fact, quite the opposite!

Highly processed food is what we call junk food. This is made that is made with preservatives ad additives, such as soda and those ready meals. And it’s these additives and preservatives that cause your hormones to go berserk to the extent that they cause your body to produce too much oil. In turn, this leads to clogged pores, which accelerates the ageing process, leaving your skin looking much older than it actually is.

Alcohol

Alcohol can give you a bad headache and make you feel sick. You know all about that. But it can also cause bad skin by virtue of the fact that, like coffee, it’s a diuretic that causes you to dehydrate.